


Aliens and Asterism

by Max_Mercury773



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: College, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Mutual Pining, Self-Denial
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-16 19:47:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16501610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Max_Mercury773/pseuds/Max_Mercury773
Summary: On a damp August night, Yachi has a conversation with her new best friend, Oikawa Toru. She continues the descent into his tumultuous world with caution and just a teensy bit of infatuation.





	Aliens and Asterism

**Author's Note:**

> Is this ship called YaOi? If not, it should be.

An hour ago, the rain died and wrestled the calm down with it.

An avid member of the two and a half member astrology club, Yachi Hitoka clutched the wooden rung of the ladder with too much strength and not enough courage. She stalled there, gulping in air, and reminded herself of the simplicity of her mission. This wasn’t like the other times.

Anxiety had no right to be crushing her windpipe, crippling her, forcing white knuckles and pale fingers to stay clamped shut. There was no tatted-up yakuza lying in wait to shank her for staring at his darling idol goddess for too long. She needn’t traverse a jungle riddled with titanic predators, only open a darn door.

All Hitoka had to do was talk, something she did every day, something she was good at given the right circumstances. Drawing in a fortifying breath of muggy August air, she eased herself out of the vice grip and continued to climb. She prayed he wouldn’t be mad.

Fifteen minutes wasn’t too long of a wait, right? In hindsight, it was amazing how quickly she came when he called. Needed help editing a paper? Hitoka was on it like ink on paper, would have it sent back by the end of the day. A professor being bitchy? Hitoka was happy to endure a two hour rant session. Locked in the bathroom without toilet paper and had class in five minutes? Hitoka had felt like the Flash that day.

But she didn’t mind it, no she didn’t mind at all. Not today, at least. They were friends. Her research paper could wait one more day and she could study for exams during the breaks between classes. Clammy hands curled around the cool steel handle and the lingering water droplets congregated, slipping into the space between her fingers. She yanked the hatch open and hoisted herself inside.

Battery powered lanterns were stuck in each corner of the room with one obscenely large one at the center.

He’d planted himself beside the telescope and underneath the window, knees drawn up to his chest, arms wound protectively around himself, fluffy chocolate bangs falling over the rim of his glasses. Even in that vulnerable position, subtle waves of the King’s intimidation had her insides somersaulting.

She shook the wet from her hands, rested her bag on the floor, and approached on the very tips of her toes. Like in every horror movie ever, the floorboards squealed loud enough to wake sleeping giants. But, that was sort of the point, wasn’t it? To wake up him up so that he didn’t jump serve her butt out of the window?

Knowing this, Hitoka still kept as quiet as a mouse, creeping like clouds towards the infamous Great King of Aoba Johsai. Even after a year of spontaneous friendship, four since his defeat at their hands, his mantle clung stubbornly to his shoulders. He’d joined his college team with no hesitation and held a 3 – 3 tie with Iwaizumi who was attending an engineering school less than an hour away.

They held practice matches every month. Off to his side, Yachi squatted with her palms on her knees.

“Um, Oikawa-kun? It’s time to wake up. Oikawa-kun, hello…?”

She groaned as the belt buckle securing her blue jeans dug into that belly squish everyone got when they bent forward. Lashes fluttered like monarch wings and chocolate eyes dared her to make a move.

Black-rimmed Harry Potter glasses teetered on the tip of his nose. Squinting, all at once the Great King came alive and starlight filled his face. A rivulet of drool dripped from his chin to his neck.

Absolutely regal, this man.

He wiped it off with his sweater sleeve which was somehow purple and beige at the same time.

“Hitoka-chan!” He adjusted his glasses. “You made it.”

Grace tinted his movements and suddenly Hitoka became painfully aware of her tiny hands, tiny frame, and overall awkwardness.

But instead of dwelling on her nerves, Hitoka pressed the illuminate button on her wristwatch and showed the time. The meteor shower started in ten minutes. His fingers coiled around her wrist and he brought the watch face close to his own. His touch felt like summer. To avoid popping a blood vessel or something equally important, she disagreed with the reality that he was touching her and busied her brain with his unnaturally pretty fingers.

Like did everything on this man have to be attractive? Oh, but it wasn’t just Oikawa. All the setters she knew had pretty fingers. She took comfort in that.

His brows drew together, lips gone pouty in concentration.

“Hitoka-chan, why do you still own a watch, never mind a glow in the dark watch?”

She pulled back and hummed thoughtfully, drawing upon her inner Tsukishima. “A better question would by, why don’t you? They have alien themed ones.”

“Touché,” he glanced at her bag, “you got the goods?”

“All the goods.”

Unzipping her bag, she pulled out two sports water bottles and handed him the one with the incurvate galaxies and spaceships. It glowed slightly. Oikawa popped the top, sniffed, and grimaced. “What’s in this?”

“I forget exactly what but Nishinoya-senpai told me it’ll work wonders during finals. He said it’ll have you crossing dimensions, but not to drink it all at once because it could maybe probably make your heart give out.”

Oikawa gave another tentative sniff. “Is it Everclear? Because if so, that’s fucking brilliant. We can’t fail exams if we’re comatose.”

“What’s Everclear?”

He gave her a pitying look. “Oh, my sweet summer child, you’ve so much to learn.”

“I don’t think I want to.”

He took a long swig of the stuff and shuddered as he swallowed. “Okay, alright, so you might want to tell your dealer he needs to tweak his formula. Who the hell would mix Redbull and Five Hour Energy?”

“How can you tell?”

“All I can say is last year was pretty rough.”

The conversation drifted towards volleyball, as it naturally did. They discussed old memories and new enemies, grudges and regrets. “The first time I saw you, you were hiding behind the orange shrimp cocktail who was hiding behind Tobio watching another team warm up.”

“That sounds about right.” Hitoka blinked. “Shrimp cocktail?”

“As soon as I said shrimp I remembered how hungry I was and how gay he was for Tobio,” he shrugged. “Orange shrimp cocktail.”

“You noticed it too? I thought I was just imagining things.”

“Duh, they may not work well but I do have eyes, Hitoka-chan.”

“Who else?”

“Everyone on Karasuno besides your coach and Caped Baldy #5.”

“Anyone on Shiratorizawa?”

In hindsight, it wasn’t the smartest thing to ask but she was just doing what she did best and continuing the conversation. She could forgive herself an occasional faux pas.

The flash in his face sent her reeling. Yachi dropped her eyes. Bitterness and nostalgia, ruined pride and the ache of broken dreams spilled out, thickening the air because Shiratorizawa meant Ushijima and Ushijima meant failure. In all the King’s glory, his one insurmountable failure had just been thrown back in his face.

She begged the ground to swallow her up.

“Ah.”

Hitoka peeked up through blonde bangs and flickering lashes.

He was looking out the window.

The night sky wept.

Movies and paintings made the event seem more apocalyptic than it truly was. A gorgeous Armageddon, but a worldwide cataclysm nonetheless. Here, the twinkling sky overhead cried as if it were remembering something sad with the kind of fondness only retrospect could gift.

They didn’t need the telescope after all.

“Hitoka-chan, do you believe in aliens?”

Fixated on the meteor shower, she murmured an ‘I’m not sure’ although it was a core requirement of joining the club. He continued on like he hadn’t heard her.

“Even though a part of me knows we probably would’ve known for sure by now if they’re real, I can’t help but hope that they are. It’s weird to say but I hope for them. Ever since I was little I’ve hoped for things more than I’ve striven for them. When I was twelve, I hoped my sister would fall down a flight of stairs when she gave me a bowl cut to go with my braces. I hoped Tobio would have every kind of non-lethal accident imaginable so that I could keep being on the court. I could keep being me then. I hoped Iwa-chan would one day turn around and finally get it through that impressively thick skull of his how I felt. God, saying this out loud sounds shitty and stupid.”

Swallowing some emotion too big and too cataclysmic to set free, Hitoka tried to come up with something to say. She hoped since she was a little girl that her gnawing anxiety would disappear and she’d discover that wonderful, mythical ‘confidence’ her mother was sure she had. She hoped she’d gain the work ethic to distribute her time evenly and not procrastinate on assignments. She hoped she’d one day be able to voice what both head and heart refused to admit.

“You’re not shitty and you’re not stupid. You are Oikawa Toru and I guess that’s all you can ever hope to be. You can never be let down by that. You can never stop being you, right?”

He was quiet for so long, Hitoka turned to make sure he was still beside her. Again, the King – no, Toru’s – face shone with a sentiment she herself recognized but refused to comprehend.

“I guess you’re right.” He cleared his throat. “Wow, that stuff is really kicking in. I feel like I could run a marathon.”

The rest of the night passed uneventfully. They chatted and laughed and gossiped and before she knew it, the sun was peering out from the horizon. Her bag, filled with candy wrappers and empty ramen cups slung across her shoulder, she was halfway down the ladder when he poked his head through the hatch.

“You could stay, you know,” he said with a charming grin.

Hitoka grinned back, choosing not to take his tone for what it was.

“I sure would hope so,” she chimed. “We are friends, after all.”

“Stay.”

Instead of doing as she’d have normally done, analyzing every possible interpretation of the word, bending to the King’s will, Hitoka bowed her head goodbye with an apologetic smile. She had a paper to write and three exams next week, though she did promise to text him later.

_“Stay,”_ he’d said.

And she’d been tempted to acquiesce, just like always, no matter the sleep or grade it might’ve cost her.

_“Stay,”_ he’d said and _“So sayeth the King,”_ she’d thought.

But in that moment, Hitoka had forced herself to remember what she’d just learned that night.

Oikawa Toru was no king.


End file.
